


Going Absolutely Feral And Writing Middle School Poetry

by collectingnames



Category: Original Work
Genre: Chronic Illness, Death, Gender Dysphoria, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Poetry, Yearning, excessive celestial body metaphors, gay shit, quite frankly a self-indulgent amount of religious imagery
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-31
Updated: 2020-07-02
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:40:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22485718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/collectingnames/pseuds/collectingnames
Summary: Sometimes I have An Emotion™ and write a poem about it.
Kudos: 1





	1. Celestial Bodies

**Author's Note:**

> I feel pretty clueless about poetry so, feedback in the comments is hella appreciated. Props to you if you actually read all of this shit.

I don't know if I call it love  
but I know that it makes it feel like there is a universe within me.

I know that there are stars in my heart  
and galaxies at my fingertips

Stardust fills my lungs

What resides in my chest is not a heart

It is a universe


	2. hymnal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I heard a guy say "hymn" on the radio and couldn't stop thinking about it so it turned into a poem

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Blame Hozier for my overuse of the word "devotee"

I would sing your name like a Hymn

Cry it out to the divine

sweet for your ears

I learned how to sing once

And I could remember for you

Though my memory has weakened

It stumbles and falters 

like my knees underneath me

when I catch your eye

I will scream it

Loud and long until I’ve torn my throat asunder

Into beautiful ribbons,

blood-red that I think you may like

A holy cacophony rising

from my soul

from the heart of the devotee

Or I will whisper it

A ghost from my lips come to haunt your ears

If you are ashamed

But I don’t know the color of your soul

If you want it to be our own 

Paradise

perhaps 

I will whisper it

Soft and sweet until I’ve forgotten how to sing

my throat lame with disuse

I am your devotee

I will call your name however you wish it

For it is holy to me

Plucked from my personal Scripture

If I thought you wanted to hear it

So instead I stay with it heavy on my tongue

On my knees with

My mouth glued shut by cheap wine

and paper-thin wafer

I would say it

If only I thought you wanted to hear it


	3. seance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> can you tell I'm touch-starved?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This wasn't the poem I meant to write but I wrote it anyway

The red ghost of a hand on my skin

Haunting the back of my hand

Simple as it is,

The evidence that I saw and was seen in kind

That I was seen and 

What was there was enough

Take in the simple joy

of lifting onto my toes

To rest my arms on shoulders

and wrap around a neck

While the gesture is mirrored around my waist

And I can bask in the luxury of being held

of being known

of being seen

of being haunted


	4. Body of Mine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gender

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been sitting on this idea for a while but I'm only managing to write it now. I've just been having some Trans-Your-Gender feelings lately.

I’ve grieved for this body of mine   
won’t you mourn it with me?

Won't you stay here with me?   
Mourn this body meant for someone else?

Mourn the body of someone who thrilled in living in it?   
Someone who was unafraid to live in it?

Mourn the body of who could have been?   
Imagine what a good daughter she could have been   
How proud her mother would have been

Mourn this body that destroyed itself?   
Bloodied by its own hand  
And ravaged from the inside

  
Mourn for this wasted flesh?  
This tangle of blood and bone   
housing someone who did not deserve it

Please

Please won't you lie here with me?

Please won't you lie here with me and mourn?

Please won't you lie here with me and mourn for the person who never was?

Please won't you lie here with me and mourn for the person who never was and hold me while we rot together?

Please

I promise I'll fall apart so prettily  
pretty like I was supposed to want to be

I've grieved for this body of mine

Won't you mourn it with me?


	5. the kind word for this

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (in a minor key) don't break my heart, my achy breaky heart

It aches

To be this thing, whatever it's called

Whatever we've agreed the kind word for the ugliness is

The ache starts in, belongs to, the flesh

It can't be quenched by lifeblood to the altar or a slaughtered goat at the foot of a mountain

My temple doesn't ask for blood or flesh or wine or a tenth of wealth

There are no priests and supplicants to attend to it

All that remains is a broken altar and the wrought iron frames where stained glass filled it with the never-was-holy light

It consumes, on a warpath of desecration for a place that was never consecrated

This temple was never sacred it only ever was


	6. what comes out

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh look the themes of self-harm haven't left

I miss when I understood why I did this

  
I miss being able to put an emotion,  
an event,   
to an action

I'm not even upset anymore

I'm just breaking myself open to see what comes out

But nothing does

Nothing comes out anymore

There's nothing left

It's just viscera and chemical imbalances

Nothing left that's me


	7. How to Make Tea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> how to make tea in a coffeemaker

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i lost track of what this was supposed to be about

Fill coffee pot with 2 cups water

Wonder why

Empty into reservoir

Try to piece together what’s happening

  
  


Take 2 teabags, 

wrap the strings around the handle

It’s night and I’m shaking

It’s day and I’m shaking

Start the pot

Listen to the chug of heating water

There’s a buzz of static

Burning my skin

  
  


Wait for the hissing puff of steam

Find a mug and some honey

Pour it out

Hold it

Hold it close to your chest

Hold it to ward off the shaking

Hold it and focus only on that

Hold it to your heart and pray for calm

Drink


End file.
